The New York Times/1916/11/22/Insincere, Says Harden
INSINCERE, SAYS HARDEN.
Urges Germans to Put Government into People’s Hands.
Special Cable to The New York Times.LONDON, Wednesday, Nov. 22.—The Amsterdam correspondent of The London Times writes that in a new article in Die Zukunft Maximilian Harden condemns German efforts to provoke peace discussion as insincere and useless.
He argues that for Germany to say “we do not want annexation,” but to reject the independence of every State is meaningless, because annexation nowadays is possible in forms not covered by the ordinarily accepted meaning of the word, and under the appearance of independence a State may, nevertheless, be handed over to the power of its stronger neighbor. Moreover, the statement that Germany fears no tribunal of inquiry does not mean that Germany is willing to submit her case to an impartial jury for trial of all causes of the war.
Harden urges Germany to understand the real objects of the Entente and say that they are the first to bring Germany into line with the political system of Western Europe and to end what the Entente powers certainly consider to be a survival in Germany of bellicose feudalism; secondly, to introduce into Germany parliamentary government, so that the people shall really have something to say in the policy of the country; thirdly, the establishment as the central idea of German preparations of the determination to keep the peace and not, as hitherto, the determination to be ready for war; fourthly, to restrict armaments in proportion to the population, and fifthly, to establish real international arbitration based upon such guarantees as will insure the punishment of the rebellious.
Harden indicates that an offer to endeavor to fulfill these conditions would find a fruitful response before Christmas. Meanwhile he prides himself that the German preparations for a Spring campaign are following the lines which he recommended “immediately after the disaster of the Marne and Kitchener’s sober three-year prophecy.”